Heretofore, in general, a generating apparatus using a reciprocating engine has been known as a generating facility that can be utilized easily. Such a generating apparatus generates alternating-current power by supplying a fuel such as petroleum to the reciprocating engine to drive a generator that is coupled to the reciprocating engine. Since this type of generating facility can generate the alternating-current power easily, the generating facility has been widely used for emergency.
A cogeneration-type generating facility using a large-sized turbine generator is employed in a factory or the like. The cogeneration-type generating facility has a large-sized gas turbine engine which is operated with the use of petroleum or gas fuel for driving a generator directly coupled to the gas turbine engine to generate the alternating-current power. With the cogeneration-type generating facility, the alternating-current power generated by the generator can be utilized in the factory, and exhaust heat generated by the gas turbine engine can also be utilized as well in the factory. Therefore, an overall energy-utilization-efficiency can be increased. However, such generating facility has been problematic in that the generating facility is large in size and thus requires a large space for the installation. Further, a high initial cost is required to introduce the generating facility.
Recently, as the electric power market is liberalized under the deregulation of the electric power, there has been a growing attention to a small-sized gas turbine generating facility as a local-distributed power supply. If the gas turbine generating facility generates electric power which is surplus to requirements in a private electric power consumption, then it is preferable to interconnect the gas turbine generating facility to a commercial power supply system so as to supply the surplus electric power to the exterior. However, in order to supply the surplus electric power to the commercial power supply system, voltage, frequency, phase, and the like of the electric power to be supplied are required to agree with those of the commercial power supply system completely. Further, it is desirable that the generating facility can be operated automatically and stably. In particular, it is desirable to reach a steady-operation state in as short a period of time as possible at the time of starting.